Public Bill Committee

[Mr. Martin Caton in the Chair]

Clause 18

Responsible local authorities

Sally Keeble: I beg to move amendment 69, in clause 18, page 10, line 22, leave out from England to end of clause.
It is a pleasure to move this amendment under your chairmanship, Mr. Caton. There is a slight mistake in the amendment printed on the amendment paper, which is probably down to my drafting of it. It is supposed to delete the words from other than in paragraph (b) to the end of that paragraph, rather than from England to the end of the clause. That is not exactly clear from the amendment as it is printed.
I have alluded to the importance of housing and housing authorities. In areas where there is still two-tier local government, district councils are housing authorities. As we have discussed previously, housing is a critical factor in poverty, particularly in the material deprivation of children. Housing authorities are extremely important, not just as partner authorities, but as responsible local authorities under the Bill.
I looked at the draft regulations that are due to be introduced next year, as I mentioned previously. In their current form, they will not provide adequate protection and protocols to ensure that district councils in areas where there is two-tier local government and which are simply partner authorities, not responsible authorities, are subject to adequate safeguards so that authorities can work together properly.
I want to make only a few points, as I know that the Committee has a lot to get through. I will draw on the example of my own local authorities, which are relevant because we have two-tier local government and a large housing authority. I am sure that the Financial Secretary will correct me if I am wrong, but under existing legislation, district councils in areas where there is two-tier local government have two important powers that are relevant when considering child poverty. First, they are responsible for conducting local economic surveys, which means that they have an economic development function. That is important with regard to encouraging economic development as part of tackling child poverty. Secondly, they have responsibility for setting the local housing strategy, for which they have to assess housing need and look at homelessness and all other factors.
Those two responsibilities are critical functions when considering child poverty. It is absolutely true that where there is two-tier local government, the county council has overall responsibility for childrens services, social services and education. Those services are important for the overall well-being of children, but economic development and homelessness are important when considering the vulnerability of children, which is slightly different from what we considered previously regarding poverty. It is therefore important that housing authorities that are district councils in two-tier local government areas are responsible local authorities rather than just partner authorities.
Of Northamptonshires 700,000 people, about a thirdby far the biggest concentration of the populationlive in Northampton, which has the biggest housing stock. I should have checked the numbers before I came to the Committee, but I think it now has 11,000 to 12,000 units. The next biggest area is Corby. Both those large and complex urban areas have problems with disadvantage and child poverty. Some of the other, more rural, local authority areas have problems with poverty, but they do not have as much housing.
I do not see how child poverty can be tackled without making the two local authorities, which have problems in that regard, responsible authorities. They should not just be partner authorities. If a protocol states that the county council has responsibility, that the other council is a partner authority and that they have to find a way to work in partnership, how they are supposed to do so must be made clear. For example, when childrens issues were being looked at in the county, one of the rural authorities had to represent the housing authorities. I am sure that the person who went to the partnership meetings was experienced, passionate and committed, but the rural authority had no housing. That person could not therefore deal with the issue that they were supposed to oversee, because they were from a rural council rather than an urban one and had virtually no housing stock. The discussion with the other partner authority must have proceeded by some sort of osmosis.
There are also difficult issues surrounding data sharing, which leads me to another example of how the protocols do not work. Following the Homelessness Act 2002, there were supposed to be protocols for joint working between county and district councils to ensure that homeless children were protected and did not find themselves homeless. My hon. Friend the Member for Regents Park and Kensington, North was closely involved in that work. We struggled because, rather than giving the district council responsibility, there was a similar structure to the one under discussion with partner authorities and protocols for joint working.
I had to deal with a domestic violence case that involved children, which, sadly, occurs often, and the county was dealing with child protection issues. The family involved had a record of domestic violence with young children, and the district councils environmental health officer received a report of noise nuisance from the family living below them, who complained about fighting upstairs. However, the partner authorities could not share data, and the protocols were not in place to turn a report about serious fighting over to social services so that they could deal with the child protection consequences. If the protocols do not work on such a sensitive area of child protectionalarm bells should ring all over local government if there is a report of any risk of harm to a childI do not see how they will deliver on child poverty issues when housing is one of the measures of material deprivation and is just one issue among 21 others.
I understand that there are all sorts of issues surrounding joint working and what ought to happen, and that regulations will be introduced and the responsible authority will have a responsibility to work with the partner authority. However, district councils should be regarded as responsible local authorities, unless my right hon. Friend the Financial Secretary can think of a way of ensuring that they are involved when they have a certain amount of housing stock. Once unitary local government is in place across the country, I hope that the problems will resolve themselves. Until then, however, where there is two-tier local government, it is important that district councils are responsible, not just partner authorities, to ensure that the housing and economic development functions are dealt with properly by local government.

Andrew Selous: I welcome you back, Mr. Caton, on the final day of our proceedings on this important Bill. I am grateful to the hon. Lady, as always, for her amendment. She has raised a number of significant issues already and I am not surprisedindeed, I am pleasedthat she has come back to the important issue of housing, which she says is behind her amendment. She has been good enough to explain to the Committee what she intended by her proposal, which we understand is not exactly what went down on the amendment paper, so that is helpful in directing us along the lines that she intended.
I recognise the point that the hon. Lady has made. I started my political life in a London borough where there was just one council. I then moved to a shire county where I worked with a district and a county council, and we have just moved to a unitary basis. We have a new Central Bedfordshire council, so I am back where I started, but I acknowledge her point about the possible chasm between a county and district council where they are responsible for different services, especially housing.
The hon. Lady is right to mention housing. It creeps into the Billonly justby virtue of clause 3, on the combined low income and material deprivation target. The Minister was kind enough to supply the Committee with the 10 material deprivation questions, both to an adult and to a child. I have just looked at them and, as far as I can see, there is only one question to the child, which is whether there are enough bedrooms for every child of 10 or over to share their bedroom only with siblings of the same sex. [Interruption.] The hon. Lady is saying that there are two questions: there are other issues about having friends round for tea and so on, which, I accept, relate to housing.
The amendment does not mention housing, but the hon. Lady rightly intends to make housing more of a priority in the Bill, which does not give the emphasis and priority to housing issues that she seeks. No doubt Ministers will, perhaps correctly, argue that there are other places where that can be done.
The hon. Lady has raised an important issue. A high degree of partnership working is required, with local authorities emphatically not trying to pass the buck in relation to their responsibilities, for the issues to be properly joined up. That degree of partnership working happens between many district and county councils up and down the UK, but I have no doubt that it does not always work as perfectly as it could or should in some of them. She has recounted experiences from her own area in that regard.
Clearly, we will not vote on this probing amendment, but I am grateful to the hon. Lady for raising an important issue. I shall listen with interest to the Ministers response.

Steve Webb: The spirit of the amendment is right housing is a key element of the anti-poverty strategy, and the district councils will have a key role to play. My reservation about the amendment, as the hon. Lady intended it to be tabled, is that we could end up with two separate principal authorities responsible for developing a child poverty plan in a given area. One of my worries about the Bill relates to central Government. As we heard earlier, there was a bit of hesitation as to where the buck stops: if it is everyones responsibility, it is no ones responsibility.
My worry is that if we have two separate tiers of local government, each responsible for drawing up its own plan, affecting in some cases the same set of people, that could create an unnecessary overlap. I therefore hope that we get reassurances that district councils and their housing functions will be central to the delivery of the Bill. I am not wholly convinced that the amendment is the way to do it.

John Howell: I agree with the points that have just been made. I, too, see the importance of including housing as it is a central part of understanding and combating child poverty. However, in my experience, trying to put in another principal authority would lead to chaos. We need a clear line of responsibility for somebody to take the initiative. Local government does everything these days on a partnership basis, and there is a lot in the Bill about encouraging that.
For those reasons, the principle of allowing district councils to come in and play an important part is already strengthened in the Bill. Considering them partner authorities in no way reflects on their import or status in putting the strategies together. Certainly, that is not currently a restriction in relation to the strategies that local government is putting together to address child poverty issues, and changing it would lead to more confusion and delay in trying to get a strategy in place.

Helen Goodman: May I say what a pleasure it is to serve under your chairmanship this morning, Mr. Caton?
I fully appreciate the sincere concerns of my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton, North about giving housing its rightful place as we move forward with the strategy to combat child poverty and about ensuring that local government bodies with responsibility for housing play their full part in the partnership arrangements. Respondents to the consultation on the Bill were clear about the importance of effective partnership working. They believe that it is important that the Bill should set a clear framework for co-operation between local authorities and their partners, and that those arrangements should be delivered through existing partnership structures, such as the local strategic partnerships. They were also clear that although it is important that the Bill should set a framework, it is effective practice and support that results in good partnership working.
My hon. Friends amendment is technically defective because it would not achieve her aim; the effect of her intended amendment would have been to remove from all authorities, other than county councils, the responsibility for putting in place arrangements to co-operate. Therefore, in areas covered by unitary authorities or London boroughs, for example, no authority or other body would be responsible for putting arrangements in place for co-operation to reduce and mitigate the effects of child poverty.
I know that my hon. Friend is particularly concerned about the effectiveness of partnership arrangements between county councils and district authorities in relation to housing. Housing clearly plays an important role, but, as hon. Members have said, making non-unitary district councils responsible authorities would not result in effective partnership working. One body must take overall responsibility for ensuring arrangements to co-operate in the local area. Making all district authorities responsible authorities, alongside their respective county councils, would mean that in any one area a number of bodies would have the responsibility. That would clearly result in confused accountability.
I would like to draw my hon. Friends attention to what Kevan Collins said in evidence:
I do not know what other body locally would be the appropriate one. The local authority has a special, important place in convening, and a leadership role in all these matters, so it is absolutely right that the responsibility is distributed in that way.[Official Report, Child Poverty Public Bill Committee, 20 October 2009; c. 60, Q134.]

Sally Keeble: I completely recognise the practical difficulties of the amendment as it is drafted. I would appreciate it if my hon. Friend said how she expects the partnerships to work and what kind of protocol should be in place. The key is ensuring that we do not end up with the county council and one district council deciding all the other areas. I am particularly interested in the protocols; I am sorry if I did not make that clear enough in my speech.

Helen Goodman: I am about to draw my hon. Friends attention to the later parts of the Bill where the processes are set out.
It is clear that partner authorities must play a full part in the local arrangements to tackle child poverty. The local needs assessment, in clause 21, and the joint local child poverty strategy, in clause 22, are framed in the Bill as the responsibility of the partnership, not just the responsible local authority. Clause 22(2) states:
The joint child poverty strategy must set out the measures that the responsible local authority and each partner authority propose to take,
which means that it must cover the actions of all the main partners with responsibility for housing, including district authorities.
I hope that my hon. Friend can see that the upper-tier authority will have a leadership role in convening the partners together. However, for needs assessment, strategy and action, all the partners will have a responsibility to fulfil their duty and play their part. In addition, the draft regulations for local needs assessment, which we have circulated to the Committee, will require those assessments to cover a range of local services, including housing.
The arrangements for partnership working set out in the Bill are the right ones, but it is clearly important to ensure that they result in effective working practice. Statutory guidance made under the Bill will build on the good experience of some local authorities, providing information and guidance on how to ensure that local government and its partners can maximise the opportunities for effective partnership working. With those reassurances, I hope that my hon. Friend will withdraw her amendment.

Sally Keeble: I am grateful to the Minister for setting out what I wanted to be set out when I tabled the amendment. I shall look carefully at the regulations and the guidance, but having received assurances I am happy to beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 18 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 19

Partner authorities

Andrew Selous: I beg to move amendment 3, in clause 19, page 10, leave out lines 38 and 39.

Martin Caton: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: amendment 62, in clause 19, page 11, line 3, at end add
(i) a Mental Health Trust..
Amendment 73, in clause 19, page 11, line 3, at end insert
(i) a Regional Development Agency,
(j) Learning and Skills Council..

Andrew Selous: There are three amendments in the group, and I shall go over them in turn.
Amendment 3 is a probing amendment and not one that I intend to press to a vote. It is intended to provoke some debate about the inclusion of police authorities and chief officers of police as partner authorities in eradicating child poverty. I recognise that they are statutory bodies and already members of local strategic partnerships, which is entirely appropriate in the context. However, I must admit that I find it a little difficult to understand their core role and purpose in defeating child poverty, particularly given how child poverty is defined in the Bill, with the four targets specifically focused on income poverty.
I can see that the police have a role in child well-being, because children need to be safe and secure; that is even more important for children than for adults. The Government, however, rejected our amendment 58, which sought to place well-being in clause 8. We were told that the Bill is not about childhood well-being, which is fair enough; that is the Governments prerogative. However, I was left questioning why chief officers of police and police authorities are mentioned.
It is not just me who suffers from a little confusion about such matters. When we saw reference in the Bill to chief police officers, Conservative Members said that they thought it appropriate for the Association of Chief Police Officers to give evidence to the Committee. ACPOs feedback was that it was not sure why it was being asked to give evidence in discussions about a Child Poverty Bill and that it could not see the immediate relevance of being asked to do so; I am not the only one to question its involvement. Involving ACPO would certainly do no harm, but I can see more logic in amendment 62, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness. That would include mental health trusts in the list of partner authorities.
It is almost a clichĂ(c) to say that mental health trusts are the Cinderella service of the NHS, but they seem to be cast in that role given that the Bill makes no reference to them. I have no doubt that the Minister will direct me to clause 20(1)(c) and say that local authorities can include mental health trusts if they so choose. However, it is a little odd to say that councils must work with the police whether or not councils think that they are helpful, but that councils only may work with mental health trusts. It would be more logical to put things the other way round, as my hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness will explain with his customary panache when speaking to his amendment.

Steve Webb: I have huge sympathy with the idea that mental health is a key issue in tackling child poverty. I suppose that the rationale behind the list might be that it covers a set of commissioning bodies. For example, acute hospital trusts are not included in the list; presumably, that is because primary care trusts decide what they do and how they spend the money. Does that not apply to mental health trusts, too?

Andrew Selous: There may well be logic in what the hon. Gentleman says, but I am concerned about the fact that mental health trusts are statutory bodies. He is correct to say that they clearly have an important role, but I am questioning why they should not have a seat at the table, as of right, because they are spending public money and providing services. I accept that they are not the commissioning bodyprimary care trusts arebut mental health trusts have a vital role in helping parents of children with mental health problems get back into the workplace and thus enable children to be the productive workers of the future. I shall listen with interest to what my hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness has to say on the subject.
I have some sympathy with amendment 73, which was tabled by the hon. Member for Regents Park and Kensington, North. We could argue that regional development agencies, learning and skills councils and their successor bodies, which are charged with local economic regeneration policy and local skills training, have a good case for being included in the Bill. So, perhaps, do chambers of commerce and further education colleges, as they play an integral part in what we are trying to do.
The hon. Ladys amendment is supported by London Councils, the collective body that represents all local authorities in London. It thinks it surprising that regional development agencies and the Learning and Skills Council, which is soon to become the skills funding agency, have been omitted from the list of partner authorities. No doubt my hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness wishes to speak to his amendment, but I will listen with interest to the rationale for the current list of partner authorities when the Minister responds.

Karen Buck: As we have heard, the danger of having a list of partner authorities is that we focus on the partners that are not in the list, but the danger of having a comprehensive list of dozens of partner agencies is that everybody feels that responsibility lies elsewhere. It is then hard to focus, and some of the work at local-area-partnership level reflects that.
I have a strong view that it makes sense to keep a tight focus. The emphasis at the local level on commissioning is sensible and sound, and we should not dilute responsibility too much. However, in practice there is frequently a weakness in the relationship between a local authority, those agenciesthe PCT and othersthat commission services in the area, and the more regionally based and, in some cases, national organisations, whose service delivery and commissioning can have huge implications for a local area service.

Sally Keeble: Does my hon. Friend agree that where there is a local prison, particularly a womens prison, it might be appropriate for the responsible authority to look to involve that body when discussing the poverty of prisoners children?

Karen Buck: I can certainly see my hon. Friends point. I am sure that everyone here has experienced constituency casework involving a lack of communication and a lack of data that would allow policy to be shaped on prisoners children and many other issues.
The two agencies that I want to add to the list are particularly important and germane. The regional development agencies have a driving role in child care delivery, and the Ministers have graciously conceded the importance of child care as a key policy commitment to be specified in the Bill. I welcome that, but the resourcing of a significant amount of child care to assist in the employability of parents is done through the regional development agencies. For example, the London Development Agency is the delivery agent for the child care affordability programme in London, which has significantly helped to deal with affordability and child care delivery. It has just awarded another £1 million to my local authority to provide 200 child care places for parents seeking work. Having that bound into the local delivery of child care provision is critical, and I therefore strongly commend the inclusion of the regional development agencies.
The Learning and Skills Council, which is soon to change its name to the Skills Funding Agency, is also very relevant, and I shall give an example of why. Last week, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions came to a school in my constituency and met a group of parents who were supported by a voluntary organisation called Women Like Us, which does important outreach work in traditionally hard-to-reach communities, with primarily Bangladeshi and Arabic-speaking women. A strong message from the women to my right hon. Friend was that many of them wanted to work in schools and child care settings because the working hours made a great deal of sense for them as parents, and there was also a cultural dimension, in that they regarded such settings as good and safe places to begin their working lives. However, they were not funded, so they were required to pay for a level 3 national vocational qualification in child care, which is now a necessary qualification for working in a school setting. On the one hand, the accreditation standard for working in child care has changedwhether through local authority or national Government determination I do not knowand, on the other, LSC funding of skills training has not changed, so there is a gap between the training that parents require to fill the available jobs and the funding. That is a good example of where we need to tie up more effectively how we resource skills training with the kind of jobs people want to take and are preparing for. There are good arguments for those two agencies, if we are to have a specified list of partner agencies. I look forward to my hon. Friend the Ministers response.

Graham Stuart: It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr. Caton. I shall speak primarily to amendment 62 which, as my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Bedfordshire commented, would add mental health trusts to partner authorities. The hon. Member for Northavon pointed to the logic of omitting mental health trusts from partner authorities but I shall explain why I believe that logic is flawed in practice.
I will make a few comments about the prevalence and impact of mental health, and the reasons why it is relevant to any debate on child poverty, even in a Bill that centres mostly on incomes rather than wider issues. According to the brilliantly named Dr. Nurse, the national lead for public mental health and well-being at the Department of Health, one in six of the adult population experiences mental ill health at any time. Some 10 per cent. of children have a mental health problem, which for many continues into adulthood, and 15 per cent. of people experience a disabling depression at some time. One in 100 people has a serious mental health problem. It goes without saying that those problemsparticularly in the acute phasehave a real impact on a familys ability to manage finances and ensuring that the children do not suffer poverty. Kings Fund research estimated that mental health problems in England had a social cost of £71.1 billionaround 5.3 per cent. of gross domestic productin 2007. Increasing trends of poor mental health mean that, by 2026, the cost of mental health problems is projected almost to double to £136 billion, which will be made up of more than £47 billion of health and social care service costs, and £88 billion a year from loss of employment. That figure can be compared with the £95 billion that we currently spend on the NHS each year.
Mental health is therefore a hugely important issue that will grow in importance over coming years. It is obvious that the loss of employment through poor mental health will have a serious impact on the income of a household in which a child is growing up, as well as possibly on the health of the parent and the quality of parenting that they can provide. Poor mental health in children has an effect on educational outcomes and school drop-out rate. It clearly has an impact on their life chances and ability to move out of poverty for good. I put it to the Minister that it would almost be perverse not to include mental health trusts as partner authorities when poor mental health will be one of the most significant determinants of household income and child welfare.
I now come to the succinct point that was well made by the hon. Member for Northavon about the logic that the Bill includes primary care trusts and strategic health authorities as partner authorities and that they are the commissioners of services. I put it to the hon. Gentleman and, most importantly, to the Minister that in reality that is not entirely true. In my area, there is an excellent local mental health trust that is seeking foundation trust status. It has members, a board and a chairman. The reality is that the services it provides[Interruption.] The Minister is looking dubious. The money flows through the primary care trust but I put it to the Minister that, in reality, local mental health services are chiefly commissioned by that mental health trust. It is the body with the expertise; it is not micro-managed. It gets on and provides the tapestry of services as it sees fit, working with its members, board and experts. It is not looking over its shoulder all the time to the PCT to tell it what to do, let alone to the far-distant strategic health authority whose main aim is to ensure that that trust is properly run and that its books balance. I will press the amendment to a Division and I ask Ministers to take it seriously.
The Campaign to End Child Poverty, which is run by Save the Children, Barnardos and Gingerbread, has submitted a memorandum stating:
The Campaign to End Child Poverty agrees with the Committee that parental mental ill health is a major contributing factor to child poverty. We note that Primary Care Trusts and Strategic Health Authorities are listed in Clause 19(2) as partner authorities, and suggest that these are the appropriate bodies to hold responsibility for setting out their role in the reduction of child poverty as they are commissioning bodies rather than providers.
That powerful contribution does not help my case, but I am not persuaded by this. I ask the Minister to reflect on the matter and to consider talking to others on the front line. I am convinced that mental health trusts are not merely providers at the behest of commissioners. They are effectively a real commissioner of services, and if they are not at the table when mental health has such a critical role in child poverty, there is a risk that the Bills central aims will be undermined and it will be a weaker piece of legislation. I hope that the Minister will consider that.
The Government reject the idea of including those authorities because they want things to be very local, yet they have strategic health authorities listed as partner authorities. That is rather peculiar. The hon. Member for Regents Park and Kensington, North talked about child care and also what the regional development agencies are there to do. The Learning and Skills Council is there to provide skills and promote enterprise. It was disappointing and slightly bizarre that the Government did not see fit last week to accept our amendment that would have put the promotion of enterprise as a route out of child poverty in the Bill.

Helen Goodman: This collection of amendments relates to clause 19, which sets out the partners that must work with local authorities to tackle child poverty at a local level. As child poverty is complex and multifaceted, it is clear that a range of partners must be engaged in local action on this issue. I remind the Committee that the clear message when we consulted on the content of the Bill was that measures to promote local action would succeed only if they covered action by all relevant partners in a local strategic partnership. We heard that again from the local partners who gave evidence to the Committee on 20 October. This is one reason why we have included police authorities and chief officers of police in the list of partners in the clause. Amendment 3, which was tabled by the hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire, would remove them from that list.
Everyone in the room will agree that crime blights the lives of many families living in the most deprived areas. For example, in 2008-09, the burglary rate for households in the most deprived areas was more than double that in the least deprived areas. Crime must therefore be tackled if we are to improve childrens life chances. The vast majority of poor families are hard working and law abiding. However, when parents do engage in crime, it increases the likelihood that their children will suffer from poverty and deprivation. I emphasise to the hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire that we are asking the police to be involved in the needs assessment and the strategy formulation. I am sure that he can see that the police are a centrally important partner in assessing what is going on in a local area and deciding what actions should be taken.

Andrew Selous: I do not dispute for one moment that crime is a blight on every community in this country and that it often impacts disproportionately on the poorestthe Minister is absolutely right to say that. However, coming back to the Bill and the targets in clause 2 to 5, the only one she can hang this on is material deprivation because all the others relate to specific levels of income. Looking again at the list of questions to adults and children about material deprivation, I cannot see one that relates to crime. How will we tie in the police if they are not on the Ministers list in the area that she claims is important?

Helen Goodman: Let me give another example, which is connected to something that one of my hon. Friends said. It is well known that children whose parents have been found guilty of criminal activity are themselves far more likely to be found guilty of such activities. That clearly impacts on their capacity to find work, better themselves and move out of poverty. Over the last three weeks, the hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire has repeatedly emphasised the importance of getting to the root of the problem. I would have thought that he would acknowledge this to be one area where we are doing just that.
As the hon. Gentleman knows, police forces play an active role in LSPs and the delivery of local area agreements across the country. That partnership working is a key element of the Bill. We expect local child poverty strategies to be developed and delivered through the existing structures, and will make that clear in the guidance. The Bill requires partners to strengthen their partnership working in order to offer families in poverty the most effective service possible. The police are an important part of existing partnership structures, so such arrangements should not place undue burdens on them. I hope that hon. Members will recognise the crucial role played by the police in supporting our communities and delivering effective local child poverty strategies, and I hope that the Committee will agree that we should not remove the requirement on police authorities and chief officers of police to co-operate with local authorities, and their partners, to tackle child poverty.
Amendment 62 has been tabled by the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness.

Sally Keeble: Does my hon. Friend envisage prisons being involved either under this clause or clause 20?

Helen Goodman: Any other body can be involved under clause 20(1)(c), if that is believed to be helpful to the delivery of the strategy. I have not considered the case of prisons before now, so I will not make any commitments to my hon. Friend on that point.
Let me return to the issue of mental health trusts. Nobody doubts the significant link between mental health issues and the causes and consequences of child poverty. In preparing the Bill, we considered including mental health trusts in the list of named partner authorities. However, after discussions with stakeholders, we concluded that it was important to commit those bodies with strategic influence, including those with responsibility for commissioning services, to the requirements in part 2 of the Bill. Strategic health authorities and primary care trusts are listed as partner authorities.

Graham Stuart: I put it to the Minister that mental health trusts do effectively commission services from organisations other than themselves. They drive the delivery of mental health services in a local area. They are not primarily driven by PCTs, let alone strategic health authorities.

Helen Goodman: I am sorry, but I do not accept the hon. Gentlemans description of the institutional architecture. Mental health trusts may provide good services and be imaginative and creative, but the commissioning body is the PCT.

Steve Webb: I am doing my best to be helpful this morning, but I cannot keep it up. The hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness makes an important point. The Minister refers to institutional architecture. Presumably, when every trust is a foundation trust, it will be even more the case that such bodies are free-standing and able to set their own agenda and priorities. If there is a problem with a constituent regarding mental health issues, one does not on the whole go to the PCT, but to the mental health trust. Given that the Government thought about doing that in the first placeit is not an off-the-wall suggestionwill the Minister think about it again and perhaps return to the matter later?

Helen Goodman: No. Although foundation trusts can raise money from other sources, they may use that only for the purpose of providing the goods and services agreed on with PCTs. It would, in any event, constitute only a minor proportion of a foundation trusts income and would not deflect from the PCTs requirements under the Bill.

Sally Keeble: Does my hon. Friend agree that the role of the PCT in mapping out mental health needs for communities is particularly important? She has pointed out, as I think others have, that people move in and out of mental illness. Therefore, the role of the body with a wider remit for mapping out the commissioning is particularly important, because it will be much more accurate in picking up the real needs and impact of mental health on the community and on child poverty. It is therefore right to have the PCT as a partner authority.

Helen Goodman: My hon. Friend has expressed the position beautifully; I wish I had been as clear myself.
I also want to pray in aid the wonderful clause 20(1)(c). It states that in a local area, if it is decided that there is a particular problem, it will be possible to co-opt a mental health trust. We seek, as I have said, to reproduce the arrangements, which we have, in the local strategic partnership for the sustainable communities strategy. We are not trying to set up a whole new bureaucratic system, or a whole new set of burdens on local authorities, and I would have thought that Opposition Members appreciated that point.

Graham Stuart: The Minister is being very generous in giving way. I understand her logic, but, speaking to local authorities and other agencies, one of the hardest groups to deal with is health. It is very hard to get health to work in such partnerships as it tends to bounce off. Mental health is so critical to child poverty that I ask her to think again. We can say that health may get involved, but it is difficult to get it to come to the table if it is not under a duty to do so.

Helen Goodman: I have explained that the Bill adequately covers the planning and delivery of mental health services. We will publish statutory guidance on part 2 and consult on the preparation of that guidance. I hope, therefore, that the hon. Gentleman will take the opportunity to look at the guidance. We can then take account of his views. With that reassurance, I hope that he will not press his amendment to a Division.
My hon. Friend the Member for Regent's Park and Kensington, North tabled amendment 73, which would add regional development agencies and learning and skills councils to the list of partner authorities. As she pointed out, RDAs have an important role to play in driving regional economic activity, increasing employment opportunities and supporting businesses through the current economic climate. Regional activity is important and sets a framework for local action.
However, following the recommendations of the review of sub-national economic development and regeneration, we are actively seeking to strengthen the role of local authorities in promoting economic regeneration, including the introduction of a new duty to conduct an assessment of local economic conditions. Local action on economic development has greater potential to have a direct impact on child poverty by focusing the efforts of partners on employment for parents, as part of economic and community regeneration in disadvantaged areas. As responsibility for economic development and funding is being actively devolved to local authorities, including RDAs as statutory partners, it would detract from that enhanced role to add an additional layer of bureaucracy, which would not necessarily add value to local decision making.
I know that my hon. Friends amendment is supported by London Councils. Of course, arrangements can vary in different parts of the country, depending on circumstances, and we have set up the arrangements to achieve that. I hope that the flexibility we are offering in clause 20, which would enable London local authorities to go down a slightly different route from others, is sufficient to enable her to withdraw her amendment relating to the RDAs.
In respect of learning and skills councils, we recognise that addressing the skills agenda is crucial to tackling poverty in a sustainable way. Indeed, the Bill refers to that. The LSC has not been included in the list of partners as under the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Bill, which is currently going through the House, it is proposed that the LSC will be disbanded in 2010, with responsibility for the planning, funding and commissioning of skills provision for 16 to 19-year-olds shifting to local authorities. It is therefore not necessary to engage an additional partner.
Responsibility for funding adult skills provision will move to the new national body, the Skills Funding Agency. As the arrangements for co-ordinating adult skills provision locally emerge, local authorities may choose to use clause 20(1) to engage additional local partners such as local employment and skills boards. Consultation on the Bill demonstrated that it is important that local partners are able to deliver its requirements through existing partnership arrangements. We were therefore concerned to avoid compiling and prescribing an excessively lengthy list of partner authorities. Child poverty is a pervasive and significant issue of interest to a wide range of individuals and organisations, but the list could have become unworkable. That is why we have focused on the key influencers in local strategic partnerships, which allowed the flexibility to co-opt further partners in clause 20.
I hope that hon. Members are satisfied that, for the reasons I have set out, the current list of statutory partners is appropriate. Police forces should not be removed from the list as they are already a key partner within local strategic partnerships, but the local commissioning role of PCTs means that it is not necessary to add specific health providers such as mental health trusts. Finally, the enhanced role for local authorities in managing the skills and economic development agenda means that adding RDAs and the LSC would introduce an additional layer of bureaucracy to partnership working. I therefore urge the hon. Gentleman to withdraw the amendment.

Andrew Selous: The Minister did not mention this, but the first thing I said was that amendment 3 was a probing amendment to tease out the Governments thinking about the inclusion of police authorities and chief officers of police. Should the Government continue to ask the LSP to undertake a further range of different functions, we may have to revisit the question whether the LSP, as currently constituted, is always the correct body of organisations to confront every issue that the Government throw at it. I will say no more than that. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Martin Caton: Would you like to move your amendment formally, Mr. Stuart?

Graham Stuart: I will speak quickly and then do so. I am grateful for the Ministers comments about statutory guidance. If the Government persist in their current line that mental health trusts should not be included in the list of partner authorities, I hope that the guidance will provide added traction to make it likely that they will participate in a local strategy. However, I do not accept the point that the PCTs are the effective local commissioners of mental health services. I have a local mental health trust in my area that goes across more than one PCT. It is a powerful institution in its own right. It is going for foundation status. It is an effective commissioner of services and is critical to child poverty issues. Therefore, I wish to press my amendment to a vote.

Amendment proposed: 62, in clause 19, page 11, line 3, at end add
(i) a Mental Health Trust..(Mr. Stuart.)

Question put, That the amendment be made.

The Committee divided: Ayes 7, Noes 8.

Question accordingly negatived.

Martin Caton: The ayes have it.

Hon. Members: No, the noes have it!

Martin Caton: I am sorry. The last time I chaired a Committee I always forgot to say, Unlock, and I was thinking about remembering to say that. To avoid any doubt, the noes have it. Unlock.

Question accordingly negatived.

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

Andrew Selous: I want to ask the Government to say a little about clause 19(3), specifically in relation to Jobcentre Plus, which, the helpful explanatory notes tell us, is covered by the subsection. We have the list and we have heard a lot about the local strategic partnership but, if we are dealing with child poverty in an area, one of the key players must be Jobcentre Plus. How will things be different in future with Jobcentre Plus? My experience locally, and what I hear from colleagues across the House about the involvement of Jobcentre Plus at a local level

Helen Goodman: So that we can have a more efficient debate, could the hon. Gentleman flesh out a little more detail about what sort of flexibilities he is looking for? Then I could respond on whether we are going to go down that path.

Andrew Selous: Of course; the Minister is right to press me on that. I am talking about engagement, not about dismantling the whole benefits structureit would not be appropriate to talk about that, although we might come on to it in our discussions today.
I am talking about real engagement with local authorities on what is happening in an area in respect of job creation, the skills agenda and the quality and type of courses to which Jobcentre Plus sends people. Only last week I had an e-mail from a constituent who is furious that Jobcentre Plus has sent his engineering graduate son on a wholly inappropriate coursehe had less access to computer facilities to look for work than he would have had at home. That is, frankly, a waste of money and has discouraged that individual.
I am talking about a range of issues with Jobcentre Plus. How does it engage with local authorities? It is not always as good as it should be at sitting down with local authority leaders, councillors, council officers and the economic regeneration department of a local area, and getting stuck in at the local level. I visit my local jobcentre regularly. Excellent, dedicated, hard-working people work for Jobcentre Plus. My impression is that they report up to their district manager, who in my area covers the whole of Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire. The district managers look up to the Minister and her ministerial team, but are not as good as they could be at looking outwards in the local area. I think that part 2 of the Bill is about getting all the playerswe have heard about the role of the local strategic partnershipto be fully effective at a local level.
In addition, Jobcentre Plus is not good at engaging with the voluntary sector in local areas, and in some cases it is a hindrance to effective engagement. It has stopped the co-operation that used to exist, and which still exists between other organs of the state such as social services, the probation service and health visitors. Jobcentre Plus just says, No, we cant signpost, we cant do that work. I am talking about basic things such as the provision of emergency food supplies.
I do not know what the Minister does in her constituency on a Friday night when constituents come to her and say that they have no money or food in the house. I ring up my local Salvation Army, because I know that it has food and will take it to that family over the weekend. Why can Jobcentre Plus not signpost that type of service, to tell people that it is available? It is reluctant to do that. I have engaged with the issue for about a year, and have teased it out through a series of parliamentary questions and letters to some of the Ministers departmental colleagues.
There is great scope for that sort of partnershipworking better with local authorities, the local business community, local colleges and training providers, and voluntary agencies specifically helping in that area. Such work needs to be different and better. If the Bill makes no difference and the situation continues as it is, I am not filled with hope that we will achieve the Bills worthy aims. I hope that fleshing out my concerns has been useful to the Minister, and I will be grateful for her response.

John Howell: I am a bit frustrated with clause 19, and with part 2 of the Bill as a whole, because they do not seem to relate in any sensible way to what happens on the ground. I wish to probe Ministers more on what they think local strategic partnerships do. If the list of commissioning organisations that we have discussed is supposed to represent the bodies that sit on a local strategic partnership, I should say that it does not. The local strategic partnership that I sat on had representatives from the voluntary sector, the Churches, and other bodies that were there because in the mind of that local authority they had a role in addressing the areas problems.
I cannot see why it is necessary to have a list in this part of the Bill at all. I think Richard Kemp said in his evidence that what was needed was not a duty and all that comes with that, including listing the people who have to co-operate, but a general encouragement for all organisations, including local and national ones, to co-operate in dealing with the child poverty strategy. That would be better.
It is also a bit strange to consider that the child poverty agenda is taken down just one avenue within a local authority. There is not just one channel. I refer Members to my speech on Second Reading, in which I listed seven strategic partnerships, of one sort or another, that the county council in my constituency has, and through which the issue of child poverty runs. The issues that that council has identified as the hotspots in its area for tackling child poverty are in many ways particular to it, and would not be the same for another local authority, even a neighbouring one. I do not see why we are restricting, trying to hem in and make incredibly bureaucratic something that we should trust local government to do. In the evidence sessions, the local government authorities gave enough evidence to show that they are already doing it, and are in many ways streets ahead of national Government, particularly in getting to grips with tackling the real effects of child poverty and producing successful outcomes.

Helen Goodman: The hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire asked about the role of the DWP and jobcentres, as set out in subsection (3). Clearly the legislation makes a difference as it ensures that jobcentres are partner authorities, so the duties to co-operate in making the needs assessment, in setting out the strategy and in taking subsequent responsible action will move from a can do to a must do. That is a very significant change in the Bill.
We have some good experience. In parts of the country, for example, we have a work-focused services child poverty pilot in which people from jobcentres are working within Sure Start centres to engage with and help peopleparticularly mothersback into work. We have just launched a school gates project to improve partnership working between schools and jobcentres, which again is to help mothers back into work. Data-sharing pilots in three local authoritiesLiverpool, Kent and Leedstest the current process for local authorities.
City strategy pathfinders are developing strategic plans to address problems in their areas. For example, in east London we are bringing together local services through pooled funding so that childrens centres, schools, youth offending teams and others are brought alongside the worklessness, skills and FE teams. We also have joint working with Her Majestys Revenue and Customs. In Cornwall, a beacon authority has been joint-working with the DWP, pooling budgets and data sharing, and the £600,000 Real Choices child poverty programme. I could go on about Lancashire, Waltham Forest and so on, but I will not. Those are examples of good practice. I am perfectly well aware that good practice does not exist throughout the country, but we are going to put new responsibilities on the jobcentres and our objective is to build on those places where there is good working.

Andrew Selous: I am grateful for that and I do not doubt that there are good examples of best practice across the country. Where it is relevant to meeting some of the deprivation issues that we have been discussing, will she also refer briefly to Jobcentre Pluss co-operation with the voluntary sector?

Helen Goodman: I must admit that I was slightly concerned by what the hon. Gentleman said on that score. As someone who used to work in the voluntary sector, I favour its involvement and co-operation with local authorities on anti-child-poverty initiatives. That seems to be rather different from what he suggested, which was that it should signpost people who phone up the DWP to the voluntary sector rather than to statutory provision. He mentioned the instance of people phoning up; in my constituency I signpost them to the crisis loans facility in the social fund, and I think that all hon. Members ought to do the same. I would be extremely concerned if he was suggesting that instead of signposting people to the social fund, which is meant to be the safety net at the very bottom of the social security system, we should divert them to the voluntary sector.

Andrew Selous: Of course I recognise the important work that the social fund does and of course I direct my constituents there. I hope that the Minister recognises that the benefits system, comprehensive as it is with wonderful aspirations, is not perfect, and that people fall through the net of crisis loans and the social fund.
I would not be surprised if, like me, the Minister has constituents who find over a weekend that the social fund or the Jobcentre is not always able to helpperhaps because a decision maker is still looking at their case. It is fairly regular in my casework to find constituents who, for whatever reason, have no money and no food over the weekend, notwithstanding the best efforts of the social fund and the staff in the Jobcentre. In those circumstances, does the Minister not think it sensible for Jobcentre staff to have a list of voluntary organisations that could help over the weekend?

Helen Goodman: Again, I do not share the hon. Gentlemans conception of the appropriate role of the voluntary sector.

Karen Buck: The point about such emergencies, which we all experience, is important. Although charitable enterprises can be vital in helping people, if I was confronted with the case of a parent and children who had no money to feed themselves over the weekendas I have been on occasionI would get in touch with the duty social worker and ensure that there was a guarantee of help, rather than relying on the possibility of a voluntary or charitable organisation filling the gap, however good they might be.

Helen Goodman: My hon. Friend demonstrates immense common sense. We now direct people to the voluntary sector on things such as debt advice. However, the route to which my hon. Friend pointsthat of relying on the statutory servicesis the proper approach. I do not think that I can add any more to what I have said.

Andrew Selous: I will come back one more time as this is an important issue. The hon. Member for Northavon often asks for numbers when talking about these issues, and he is right to do so as he wants to know the scale of the problem. I do not know whether the Minister is aware of the food bank network up and down the country. It provides the sort of assistance that I mentioned is provided by the Salvation Army and others. Last year, 24,000 people in this country went to food banks. That indicates that these are not isolated cases, and that up and down the country there are instances where such measures are needed, notwithstanding the best efforts of staff at Jobcentre Plus and the social fund, the call centres, emergency social workers and so on.
I do not for a moment suggest that we should sweep away any of the statutory provision. The first duty is for the statutory services to work well and properly. I ask the Minister to look at the evidence and the facts, and perhaps to reconsider the issue.

Helen Goodman: I know very well that the voluntary sector plays a fantastic role in this country. It innovates, provides examples of best practice and, by co-operating locally on the child poverty needs assessment and strategy, it has a significant role to play. However, my view remains that we should not rely on, co-opt or drive the agenda of the voluntary sector. It should remain what it is: voluntary and independent. I do not agree with the picture drawn by the hon. Gentleman, and I am not sure that it is strictly relevant to the clause.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 19 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 20

Co-operation to reduce child poverty in local area

Andrew Selous: I beg to move amendment 4, in clause 20, page 11, line 45, leave out each and insert those.

Martin Caton: With this it will be convenient to discuss amendment 5, in clause 20, page 11, line 45, after authorities, insert as the authority thinks fit.

Andrew Selous: The amendments are about giving responsible local authorities the flexibility to achieve their statutory duties in the way that they believe is best for them. I put it to the Minister that clause 20(1)(b) is too prescriptive and smacks in part of a Government who do not trust local people to exercise accountability on their local authority through the ballot box.
I offer an analogy to explain my rationale. It would be fair enough if the task demanded by Government of a local authority or any organisation was to shift a load of bricks from one side of a building site to another. It would not be right, however, for central Government to dictate exactly how that task should be done in over-prescriptive detail. The Minister referred in earlier debates to the importance of clause 20(1)(c), which gives local authorities some flexibility, which we welcome. It is important to have the ability to include bodies that are not in the list in clause 19. My worry about subsection (1)(b) is that it might force people to waste timeto come to meetings where they might not have anything to contribute. We believe in giving more responsibility and trusting local authorities more, rather than trying to pin them down and telling them whom to work with, without any choice.

Graham Stuart: It is also about giving local authorities a sense of ownership and empowerment to tackle these difficult issues. Rather than engage in a needless bureaucratic exercise, they should focus on the job in hand and the place in which they find themselves. My hon. Friend is right to table amendments to give that freedom and sense of empowerment to local authorities.

Andrew Selous: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I do not want to labour the case for these two amendments. I have set out my concerns about wasting the time of public services. When people travel to meetings, there is a cost. If they are not at their desks, they are forgoing time and attention that they could be devoting to other areas. If they have something to contribute, they should do so and, of course, the local authority can insist on that. For instance, a local authority can say to the health services that action is needed on a health inequality, or say to the police that action is needed in a particular area. It can say to Transport for Londonor whoeverthat the buses are not running between where people are living and where the jobs are. That is absolutely right. However, this proposal is over-prescriptive and runs the risk of wasting public servants time, which I am trying to avoid.

Jamie Reed: I share, appreciate and commend the hon. Gentlemans commitment to localism, which is absolutely right, but I wonder whether he shares my concern. I made the point during the evidence sessions that we have some dreadful local authorities that need a central mechanism and measurement process to ensure that they do what we ask of them.

Andrew Selous: I am delighted to welcome the hon. Gentleman as a fellow localist. My party does not have a preserve of interest in localism. I understand what he is saying but there is a different way to achieve what we both seek: partly through the ballot box and partly through measurement by results that are made public. We will come on to data sets and measuring when we reach our stand part debate. However, I would say to the hon. Gentleman that the way in which to achieve the outcome that he wants is not to be over-prescriptive, but to judge by published results. Any council that was doing badly could then experience an element of shame, and there would also be local elections and the local ballot box.

Jamie Reed: The method that the hon. Gentleman is outlining is helpful to us, and it would be helpful to the local authorities in question. However, I cannot help but think that it would not be helpful to the people and the children whom we are trying to help, and helping them is the purpose of the Bill.

Andrew Selous: I understand where the hon. Gentleman is coming from, but to be honest I think that there is a straightforward disagreement about the best approach. I believe in accountability and people being judged by results. I believe that the approach that I have outlined is preferable, so I commend amendments 4 and 5 to the Committee.

Helen Goodman: I shall speak to amendments 4 and 5 at the same time as they are so clearly linked. I point out to the hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire that, on its own, amendment 5 is ambiguous, as it proposes that authorities should be replaced
as the authority thinks fit.
That would mean that the amended line of the clauseline 45would read each of its partner authorities, as the authority thinks fit. That has no clear meaning.
Taken in conjunction with amendment 4, however, the effect of amendment 5 would be to change line 45 from stating each of its partner authorities, as the authority thinks fit to those of its partner authorities, as the authority thinks fit. That would mean that responsible authorities would not have to promote co-operation with all the named partner authorities, which would certainly weaken the impact of these partnership arrangements.
The consultations that we undertook while preparing the Bill made it clear that local partners thought that tackling child poverty must be a shared responsibility of all key partners, rather than there being an opt-in system. It is clear that the local authority has a lead role, but other local partners must also play their part. The importance of partnership working was clearly demonstrated by the evidence that we heard from witnesses on 20 October.

David Gauke: Amendment 5 is not saying that there should be no partner working at all. It proposes that the local authority should decide which of the potential partner authorities it should work with. Why is the local authority not in a position to make that judgment?

Helen Goodman: As we discussed earlier in the sitting, we are trying to reproduce the arrangements for the local strategic partnership, because we believe that that will be a less bureaucratic approach. Consequently, we are giving local authorities the flexibility to co-opt further partners, should they wish to do so.
The Bill specifically states that partnership arrangements involve all partners but it is not prescriptive, as the hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire seemed to believe, about the form that those arrangements should take. For example, the Bill does not specify attendance at a particular number of meetings. I believe that we have got the balance right in the Bill.
Only by requiring local authorities to make arrangements that will make co-operation between the authority and each of its named partner authorities can we be confident that the full range of individuals, organisations and bodies that can make a real and lasting difference to the lives of children in this country will be fully engaged in the task. That is why the clause is worded as it is.
Amendment 5 proposes that it would be up to the local authority to determine which local partners should be involved. Although I appreciate the need for flexibility to suit local needs, the amendment would raise questions about who should be involved. Therefore, it would weaken the local authoritys ability to involve all the necessary partners.
As it stands, the duty proposed in the clause will ensure that all local authorities and their named partners can share their knowledge and understanding, their interests and influence, and the resources that they have available to tackle the issues that affect child poverty in their local areas. That process is not about imposing new systems and structures that will divert attention and resource away from action, as the hon. Gentleman suggestedquite the opposite. The requirement is to create an impetus across the country that those who are already collaborating can take further and so that those who could do more will have the stimulus to do so.

Graham Stuart: The Minister is makes some interesting points. Let us say that a local authority sets up a child poverty group and decides not to have a partner authority on that group. Would she consider that appropriate? It might be useful if local authorities do not start out thinking that each time they meet under the child poverty banner, they must have all the partner authorities around the table or they will in some way be failing to deliver under the Bill.

Helen Goodman: When the Bill is passed into statute, the local authorities and partner authorities should fulfil their duties and responsibilities. It is for the leader authority to take the initiative and for all the partners to co-operate in the needs assessment and the strategy. If subsets of institutions want to concentrate on particular aspects, that seems to be perfectly sensible. However, it would not obviate the need for all the named partners under the Bill to fulfil their statutory responsibilities.

Graham Stuart: I imagine that there would be a local area child poverty steering group. Is the hon. Lady saying, on the basis that we are considering not a subset but the overall position, that the police would need to send a representative each time, regardless of whether what was on the agenda seemed directly relevant?

Helen Goodman: No. That was precisely what I was not saying. All those identified under clause 19 have a part to playindividually and collectively. We will work with them to ensure that their respective contributions are properly articulated, acted on and maximised.
Having had an opportunity to reflect further, I hope that the hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire will withdraw amendments 4 and 5.

Andrew Selous: I listened carefully to the Minister. Notwithstanding her remarks, there is a danger that the partner authorities, knowing that they have legal responsibilities under the Bill, will feel an onus to go along to meetings when perhaps their input would not be relevant on that occasion. There is a basic difference between us, in that Conservative Members trust local authorities to achieve the results that we all want to see in the way in which they think is best and that fits in with the particular circumstances of their local area. All that we are asking for is that degree of flexibility and discretion for local authorities, so I shall press the amendment to a Division.

Question put, That the amendment be made.

The Committee divided: Ayes 7, Noes 8.

Question accordingly negatived.

Andrew Selous: I beg to move amendment 6, in clause 20, page 12, line 5, leave out subsection (4).
The amendment would delete subsection (4), which refers to the Secretary of State giving guidance and requires local authorities to have regard to any such guidance. That phrase might appear entirely innocuous, but from my experience as a local school governor, guidance often assumes almost the status of holy writ and is virtually indistinguishable from statutory obligation. In the spirit of my previous remarks, therefore, I would like to give local authorities greater flexibility to pursue their local child poverty agendas and strategies in their own way.
As I said earlier, there is a good case for saying that all poverty is local. Depending on where in the country it occurs, different sets of circumstances trap families and communities in poverty. I have difficulty seeing how guidance given by the Secretary of State can usefully be applied in the same way from Cornwall to Dundee and from Cumbria down to Kent. I call only for local discretion and local flexibility. Local authorities will be judged on the basis of their results. They will be judged, as they should be, on how successful they are in reducing the number of children living in poverty in their area. That should be the accountability framework. We should judge by results and use comparative tables to see which councils have made progress and which have not. There is always the ballot box.

Steve Webb: This might pre-empt discussion on the next clause slightly, but does the hon. Gentleman accept that it is impossible to measure which local authorities are making progress on any of the targets in the Bill, as none of them is measured at local authority level?

Andrew Selous: The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. When we come to a stand part debate on clause 21, I would love to engage on that subject, as I tabled a written question to the Minister a couple of days ago that he very helpfully answered and that is entirely relevant to that point. If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I will park that issue for one moment. As so often, he is absolutely right to raise it, but the appropriate time to debate it, as I think you would agree, Mr. Caton, is later. The thrust of my remarks is similar to that of the points that I made on amendments 4 and 5. I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say.

Sally Keeble: I do not agree with the amendment. Guidance is important. Will my hon. Friend the Minister set out what the guidance would say? Some factors that are particularly relevant to child poverty might not always be immediately evident locally, although that might sound like a contradiction in terms. I understand the hon. Gentlemans point, but if, for example, one sits the national statistics on poverty or low birth weight in babiesa high risk factor resulting partly from povertyover the national profile of ethnicity, one finds a near-perfect fit. That might not always be immediately evident from local statistics.
Unfortunately, black and minority ethnic communities are not always engaged fully in either political parties or the democratic process. One need only look around the Committee to see evidence of that. Although black and minority ethnic communities are disproportionately affected by poverty, we do not have MPs from any of those communities in the Committee. Guidance from the Government to local authorities to point out what the national statistics show, and to suggest that they find ways to look at the matter, might be relevant. Of course some local authorities are particularly good at engaging with diverse communities and many can teach the Government a great deal on that. There is also flux in such communities: different communities are affected in different ways and therefore guidance can act as an important promptI put it no strongerto ensure that lessons are learned.
The guidance might also raise issues about the involvement of faith communities, bearing in mind that a wide variety can engage with the issue. That might be a good way of dealing withsome of the local black and minority ethnic communities. In the Bangladeshi community in Northampton, child poverty is a major issue, and there is a real need to engage. Will my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary tell us whether the guidance will touch on those factors, or is there some other way in which black and minority ethnic communities and diverse faith communities might need to be involved in tackling child poverty?

John Howell: It is difficult to see what guidance central Government can provide when, as we heard in the evidence sessions, local government is already actively participating in this area and is doing so in a diverse way. One of the impressive things we heard, which is mirrored, I hope, by our own experiences in our constituencies, is that local councils are tackling child poverty in a very diverse way. I hope that Ministers heard and read the comments of Kevan Collins, one of our witnesses who represented local government, who said in response to question 124 that guidance could easily be unhelpful.
That is a crucial issue. Will guidance be helpful or unhelpful? There is a huge potential for it to be unhelpful in that it runs the risk of harming and distracting from what is already being done. A good example of that is the distinction that is made between approaching child poverty on the basis of child poverty or family poverty. There is a completely different approach on the ground, and the guidance might distract from that.
I disagree with guidance as an automatic part of the Bill. There are three references to guidance in this Bill, as well as to additional regulations. It is typical of the master-servant relationship that has characterised this Governments attitude towards local government. Will the Minister clarify what she means by guidance? Earlier in the debate she referred to statutory guidance. In my book there is no such thing as statutory guidance. It is an obligation. That is what the statutory part of it means. We need to know, as the hon. Member for Northampton, North said, what the guidance will cover. I believe that the term light touch has been thrown about in relation to the guidance. That is a nice term of art, but we need to bring that down to something more specific.
Finally, I refer the Committee to the evidence of Colin Green, whose words sum up many of my feelings for this clause:
The Bill is an enabler: we do not need more micro-management.[Official Report, Child Poverty Public Bill Committee, 20 October 2009; c. 53, Q124.]
The Government have to show why this is not micro-management.

Helen Goodman: I hope that I am more successful in persuading Opposition Members that amendment 6 is unnecessary. Subsection (4) requires local and partner authorities, in co-operating to reduce child poverty in local areas, to have regard to the guidance given for that purpose by the Secretary of State. That means that if the authorities can demonstrate that different arrangements are effective, they may use those.
Opposition Members said that they were concerned that the requirement may be an unwarranted burden, but the exact opposite is the case. The publication of guidance by the Secretary of State will ensure that existing and emerging good practice will be captured and acted on across the country, thus helping local authorities and partners and removing a burden. In other words, each local authority will not have to reinvent the wheel as it carries out its duties under the Bill. There is already a great deal of good practice.

John Howell: I am sure the Minister is aware that good practice is already being spread among local authorities. They talk to each other, and they also have the Local Government Association, which occasionally manages to spread good practice in a positive way.

Helen Goodman: Of course. However, the Bill is designed to address child poverty across the whole country, so it is important that we put in place an approach that is likely to work across the whole country.

Karen Buck: If the picture in local government is as consistently innovative and rosy as Conservative Members would have us believe, will the Minister cast light on how many local authorities of different political persuasions had developed a strategy for investigating and tackling child poverty before the performance indicators were introduced and before the Bill was produced? I suspect that the answer is none.

Helen Goodman: I do not have the answer to hand, but I hope to be inspired before I conclude.
As I was saying, there is good practice. We have three child poverty beacon councils, from which we heard in our evidence sessions, which demonstrate that local collaboration can work extremely well. There is also, as I mentioned in a previous debate, a range of child poverty pilots through which local authorities and partners are exploring, developing and delivering new and better ways of helping children to escape the corrosive effects of poverty. Guidance based on that good practice should go some way to enabling authorities and their partners to respond positively to the duties placed on them by the Bill.
As we have emphasised, it is important that there is a consistent and coherent approach across the country to tackling child poverty. We do not want to see some areas performing significantly better than others. Guidance will help to ensure consistency and coherence, by setting out what has worked hitherto and how continuing progress can best be made.

Graham Stuart: Consistency and coherence sound attractive, but uniformity and lack of innovation are the B-sides of those words. Can the Minister reassure the Committee that guidance will not be so overwhelming and prescriptive that there is a loss of a sense of ownership by local authorities and that, although we achieve uniformity, we do so at a high price?

Helen Goodman: Of course we do not want that. The situation in my constituency in County Durham is different from that in the Financial Secretarys constituency in Newham, which is again different from that in the constituency of the hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire. There must be flexibility for local authorities to address different needs. If the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness can be a little patient, I will explain what I am driving at.
We are issuing guidance on the needs assessment, which we have circulated. It is based on the risk factors, which we know exist thanks to firm evidence about the risks of child poverty. I hope that the hon. Gentleman does not feel that we are over-prescriptive: our guidance on the needs assessment is evidence-based. I point out to my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton, North that the draft that we have circulated says that matters considered in the needs assessment must include the ethnic composition of the population, because obviously, as she says, that is a factor.
When the authority and partners go on to establish the strategy, it must relate to the needs assessmentthere is no point having a strategy that does not tackle the problem with which we are all trying to dealbut that is the point at which there is scope for local authorities and partners to behave in a more innovative and flexible way that relates to the differences between, for example, County Durham and South-West Bedfordshire. Our aim is not that the guidance should be a solution to all problems but that it should help to make the intentions of the legislation clear. We will work with local delivery partners in drafting the guidance to ensure that it meets the needs of both those that have made progress in the area and those that have been left behind.

Andrew Selous: I apologise for intervening on the Minister again. I am not trying to interrupt her flow; I just want to get one thing clear. If I understand correctly, she is saying that the guidance will relate to the needs assessment, but that it relates much less, or perhaps not at all, to how a local authority will then try to meet the needs identified in that assessment and tackle child poverty in its area. Am I right to understand that the local authority will not get in trouble in respect of the guidance in terms of how it tackles those significant issues in its local area?

Helen Goodman: In my opening remarks, I pointed out that local authorities must have regard to guidance, but if they can demonstrate different effective arrangements, they may use those. We are getting the balance right.

Jamie Reed: In my constituency, I have established an anti-child poverty coalition involving the county council, the district councils, Sure Start, churches, businesses, police and so on. Our ambition is to beat child poverty in my constituency before 2020. I am disappointed that no one at any stage of this debate has mentioned the role of a constituency Member of Parliament in tackling the issue head-on. Does my hon. Friend share my view on that? Secondly, is there anything in the BillI cannot see itto prevent me from pulling together a group of interested people to beat child poverty in my constituency before 2020?

Helen Goodman: My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. He demonstrates the great effectiveness of a dynamic, concerned and committed Member of Parliament, as I know he is, who thinks at all times of the concerns of his constituents. Nothing in the Bill would inhibit that sort of worthwhile activity. I hope, therefore, that the hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire will accept that in the interest of having effective action, we cannot put all the detail in the Bill, as that would be extremely unhelpful. We are consulting on the guidance, and I would be pleased to hear his views. I hope that he feels that we are getting the balance right and will withdraw amendment 6.

Andrew Selous: I have listened to what the Minister said. Perhaps because we are nearing lunch time, I am inclined to be a bit more charitable about this amendment than I was about the other. There is an ongoing debate to be had about the issueI will reserve our right to revisit the matter at another stagebut I welcome her offer to consult us. It is always nice to be consulted by the hon. Lady. On that basis, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

Andrew Selous: It is as good a time as any for me to refer to the question raised by the hon. Member for Northavon about how we will know whether a local authority and its partners are successfully tackling child poverty in their area. I said earlier that I want local authorities to be judged on resultswhether they are reducing the number of children in poverty in their area. The hon. Member for Northavon is correct in saying that, at the moment, we have only partial information on that.
If Members cast their minds back to the evidence sessions, they may remember the leader of Kent county council being askedby the hon. Member for Regent's Park and Kensington, North, I think how many children there were in poverty in Kent. He replied straight away, 48,000. When asked how he knew that number, he said that he had asked his officers, which is a perfectly reasonable thing for the leader of an upper-tier local authority to have done. No doubt that was the correct answer, but it is only a partial one, because in an answer to my written parliamentary question, the Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions replied:
The dataset Children in Families in Receipt of Out-of-work Benefits is currently used as a proxy to measure child poverty at the local level.
My understanding, thereforethe Under-Secretary may wish to intervene now or respond lateris that the 48,000 figure was based on the current dataset for children in Kent and related only to children in poverty in out-of-work families. As we all know, there is an enormous amountfar too greatof in-work poverty, so the number of children in poverty in Kent is probably 100,000 or so. I do not know what the exact split is between in-work and out-of-work povertythe hon. Member for Northavon will probably tell us shortly.
The hon. Lady went on to say in her helpful answer, for which I am grateful, that a revised indicator was being developed and that
This will provide information on both in-work and out-of-work poverty in the local area.
She mentioned the Centre for Excellence and Outcomes in Children and Young Peoples ServicesC4EOwhich is an excellent organisation. The Financial Secretary and I attended a conference in Manchester on child poverty, which was run by C4EO. It is doing fantastic work in this area and I pay tribute to it. The hon. Lady went on to say that it was developing a tool
to help local delivery partners analyse local data relating to child poverty. This tool will be available from the end of the year.[Official Report, 27 October 2009; Vol. 131, c. 213-14W.]
From that answer, it is not clear to me when we are to get the new combined dataset for local authorities that will measure both in-work and out-of-work poverty in an area, which is a crucial issue.
I said a few moments ago that I want local authorities to be judged by results, but we must have accurate data. We have to know what our start point is and then we can measure progress against that in local areas, so it is not just a technical issue for us policy wonks in Committee. It goes to the heart of whether the child poverty needs assessments and the local strategies will be effective. There is nothing more effective than for a local authority to say, Weve got x thousand children in poverty, then to see the reduction that is achieved and be able to measure progress. I would be grateful if the Under-Secretary enlightened the Committee on those important questions.

Steve Webb: I cannot resist a challenge. I think the hon. Gentleman has raised an important point. When the leader of Kent county council gave his figure, I spoke to him afterwards and said, Can you tell me where it came from? Here is my e-mail address. I am still waiting, perhaps because it was the answer to a different question.
The hon. Gentleman has made the very important point that, based on the latest figures on households below average income, roughly half the children in poverty[Interruption.] It is a very good guess. Roughly half of such children are classified as either lone parent not working or both members of the couple not working. There would probably be even more children in poverty if we accounted for one parent working part-time and the other not working and so on.
That raises the fundamental point that we are setting national targets based on some very specific definitions and then asking local authorities to be partners in delivering targets based on definitions that they cannot access or measure. We cannot know how many children in Kent live in households with a score of 25 on the material deprivation list, and I cannot envisage that we ever will, even with souped up sample sizes.
If we take the big survey of 40,000 or so households, split it and sub-divide it into quintiles or whatever, we will never get the figures for a small unitary local authority such as mine, South Gloucestershire. It is a real challenge to hold local authorities to account for targets when they cannot tell whether they are achieving them. The hint that we have heard in the discussion is that we will use proxies. We say, We dont really know how they are doing on the measures that we have set them, but here are some other measures that arent very different. I have a nasty feeling that that is probably the answer, but it is a strange situation that we are in.
As for the paragon in the corner, the thrusting and dynamic Member for CopelandI forget what the expression was, but it was something of that sortit is tremendous to have a local initiative, as he says, but in terms of a national target, it is very difficult to know whether one is succeeding. However, it is possible to overstate the point. Clearly, as the hon. Member for Northampton, North, said, some things fit so terribly well that they do not do too badly as proxies. I do not want to keep on rambling, but there is a serious issue. If someone has a specific target but cannot measure it, they will go for the thing that they can measure. That is the worry.
In the Bill, we quite rightly say that what matters is not just cash, but material deprivation and all the rest of it. However, all that the local authorities will see is benefit receipts and cash, and that could lead them to focus on what they can see and measure in their area, and what they will probably be held to account for. They might then miss things that are equally tangible, and that we are measuring, but cannot measure so well locally. I do not know whether the Minister can elaborate on the written answer that she gave to the hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire, but that exchange was very helpful. There is a genuine worry. It is essential to consider the facets of child poverty that we are discussing, and it is good that they are covered in the Bill, but the link between the national targets and local delivery is still unclear to me.

Martin Caton: I call John Howell.

John Howell: That was rather a surprise, Mr. Caton. I was not quite ready. I will, however, make good. The clause imposes a duty on local government. I want to question why the Government have pursued the idea of a duty, rather than other means of achieving their objectives for local government. The duty relates to
reducing, and mitigating the effects of, child poverty.
The use of the word effects is interesting. We are talking about not reducing and mitigating the causes of child poverty, but reducing and mitigating the effects. For me, effects in that context is synonymous with symptoms. The measure therefore lacks ambition and does not move us on to doing what the Bill seeks to achieve.
For reasons that I alluded to in earlier speeches and interventions, there is a considerable mismatch between parts 1 and 2 of the Bill. In part 1, an income-based strategy is set out and in part 2, a broader role is outlined for tackling what local government does in relation to it, and the duty does not seem to fit very easily in that. It would have made sense to include in part 1 a clause on tackling and measuring the causes, or the proxy for measuring the causes of poverty. Sadly, however, that was not accepted. The question still remains: what is the value of giving local government a duty, as this clause does, rather than doing things in a different way? I admit that there is some symbolism in giving local government a duty, but it is clear from the evidence from witnesses that the duty is rather meaningless, and was seen by them as a rather heavily bureaucratic approach. For example, Catherine Fitt said:
over the last few years...local government and its partners are engaging very positively.
We have heard the question of what local government did before that. The answer is that it did a lot. Paul Carters evidence alluded to that, in respect of the results from the first round of public service agreement targets and the achievements arising from them. Richard Kemps evidence was even more explicit:
Giving local government a duty would not help us.
That is very clear, and there are two reasons for that. First, the notion that all one has to do is to create a duty and the problem is solved is not only wrong, but reflects what I call the master-servant relationship that has grown up between central and local government. I thought that Richard Kemps evidence was very instructive:
You are making an assumption that a duty is necessarily a good thing but I am not convinced that it is. You can give me a duty and I can perform it well because I want tobut I would probably have done it anywayor I can perform it to meet the minimum requirements.
In other words it is, at best, a blunt tool, and not the rapier or stiletto that we need to tackle child poverty on the ground.
Secondly, local government is already doing much on the issue; we have heard a lot of examples of that. Paul Carter said that local government is already taking a long-term view of underlying problems, and had been taking such a view before the Bill was introduced. Kent is not alone in doing that; we can pray in aid plenty of other authorities as illustrations.
The way in which the clause imposes the duty is not dissimilar, in its high-level approach, to how the national indicator set asks and encourages councils to sign up to national indicator 116, which is the general indicator on child poverty. Most councils have not done so for very good reasons. They clearly did not think that it was a meaningful target, because it did not deliver any positive outcomes on the ground. They were much more focused on the causes of poverty and there were better indicators, with real outcomes, in the indicator set. For example, Richard Kemp said:
In crude terms, only 45 out of about 140 local authorities have signed up to NI 116... However, 118 local authorities are doing work on NEETs, 101 on obesity in teenage schools and 107 on under-18 conceptions.
The question remains: why impose a duty, given the existence of a national indicator set that has not been in its current form for very long? Why did the Government not use it as an alternative method? That would have been far less bureaucratic and would have still allowed for considerable flexibility.
During the summer, in preparation for the Committee, I did some research and spent some time asking my county council about the issue. Its attitude was that the Bill was largely meaningless and potentially dangerous for the reasons that we have mentionedthe Bill cuts across a lot of what it does. That was summed up in the questionI think that I asked itto Richard Kemp on whether the duty would make a difference. He replied:
So my response to your earlier question about what we would do differently as a result of the Bill is, Not necessarily anything at all.[Official Report, Child Poverty Public Bill Committee, 20 October 2009; c. 50-59, Q121-32.]
What does the clause deliver? What does the duty deliver? Where is the additionality? Why not stick with a tried and tested method that has proved to have an impact on local authorities, particularly in holding them to account?
Subsections (5) and (6) use the creation of pooled funds as the way to approach the issue. I am extremely glad to see that the measures are permissive. I hope that Ministers know peoples feelings about how pooled funds operate. The fact that many local authorities have moved on from the pooled fund method to the aligned fund method says an awful lot about the rather old-fashioned and clunky way in which the clause introduces the duty, and about how this part of the Bill tackles the whole issue of local government involvement in child poverty.

Helen Goodman: The hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire asked whether we have adequate statistics at a local level to enable local authorities to take forward the needs assessment and strategies. I would like to embark on a paean of praise for the British civil service, which has enabled me to provide the hon. Gentleman with information on the data set that is totally consistent with the parliamentary answer that I gave him a few weeks ago. I will explain the point for the benefit of other members of the Committee who might not have been following the detail of the debate.
The current data set for children in families that are in receipt of out-of-work benefits is used as a proxy to measure child poverty at local level. The fact that it is a proxy does not mean that it is not a helpful measure for local authorities, or that they cannot make an effective contribution to tackling child poverty. The targets that we set are national, not local. It is important that local authorities have the data set to inform their needs assessment and the work that they do at local level.

Steve Webb: The national target on material deprivation is children having a bedroom to themselves once they are 11 if they are of different sex. If the local authority is being measured on a proxy that has nothing to do with any of that, where is the impetus on the local authority to deliver the national targets? Where is the connecting rod? It is not in the figures.

Helen Goodman: I was going on to say that the current data set is the basis for indicator 116, which is used by local government. A revised indicator is currently being developed to measure child poverty at local level, and that will include those children who live in low-income, working families, as well as those in workless families. The revised indicator will be the proportion of children living in families that are in receipt of out-of-work benefits, or working families whose income is below 60 per cent. of median income. That will provide information on both in-work and out-of-work poverty in the local area. I anticipate that the data will be available at both local authority and, significantly, ward level, and that they will be produced annually. Data will shortly be available for 2006-07.
Work is under way at the moment with Her Majestys Revenue and Customs on revising that indicator. When it is finalised, it will be put on the Department for Communities and Local Government website. I have not got an exact date, but I assure members of the Committee that it will be before Royal Assent. Therefore, before the duties on local authorities come into effect, we will have the data.

Steve Webb: With the greatest respect, I simply do not believe what the Minister has said. The data in the Bill are based on household income. That is not the unit that claims benefit, but everybody under the same roof. The data available to HMRC are on the income of the benefit unitthe narrower definition of income. The Minister said that the data would be available at ward level. The sample used by the family resources survey is one household in 1,000, so a ward of 3,000 households would have three or four people in a sample. How can it possibly be true that data on 60 per cent. of median household income will be available, when data on household income are not collected for benefit purposes? Will the samples be big enough to have ward-level data relative to the national targets, which are on household data based on sample surveys?

Helen Goodman: For relative low income, the local measure is NI 116. It is available at local authority and lower super output area level. On material deprivation, the local measure is the index of multiple deprivation and the income deprivation affecting children index. As for absolute low income, local partners can consider that as part of their needs assessment. The hon. Gentleman is taking us into an extremely technical area, and that is not good use of the Committees time.

Andrew Selous: I hear what the Minister says. We have some sympathy for the hon. Lady because we are putting her on the spot with some technical issues, perhaps at an unexpected point in the Bill. However, the issues are vital. Part 2 is an important part of the Bill, one that I very much welcome in general. Local authorities bring something important to the table but, if we are not clear about the measurement criteria, if they are not fair, are not accurate and not reasonably all-embracing, we will get into a muddle. Will the hon. Lady write a further note to the Committee on the matter? We need a little more clarity and perhaps even more work on top of the excellent work to which she alluded, so that we know the basis on which local authorities will have to be judged.

Helen Goodman: Of course the hon. Gentleman can ask for that. When I said that our discussion was technical, I was not arguing that it was not important. However, such matters are better handled in writing, and I shall be happy to write to the Committee about them.
The hon. Member for Henley talked about the duties being placed on local authorities. The purpose of the Bill is to reduce and mitigate the effects of child poverty. That means that the partnership must tackle the causes of child poverty and mitigate the effects of child poverty. No one could object to that. It is the correct approach. Of course, the hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that local government is already doing a lot, but the important thing is that the Bill provides a framework to ensure that action is taken in all areas.
I remind the hon. Gentleman that such issues form only part of central Governments relationship with local government, not the whole of it. He might not be satisfied by my assurances, but I remind him of the evidence that we heard from the local authorities on 20 October. Catherine Fitt said that
the reason for having the Bill is to ensure consistency across the country...We are very aware that it is no good solving the problem in just one part of the country, because whether a childs needs are met should not be dependent on where they live.
Richard Kemp said that
enhancing the duty of our partners to co-operate with us around a specific thing would
help us.
Kevin Collins said:
What I find exciting is the idea that we are looking towards a collective effort on the issue...It must be a collective effort. It must be about how well people are doing to create the conditions that will reduce levels of child poverty...It is not about passing the buck to local government; it is about collective effort.[Official Report, Child Poverty Public Bill Committee, 20 October 2009; c. 50-51, Q121-134.]

Graham Stuart: May I take the Minister back to the regional issue? If we looked at child poverty on a regional basis as opposed to a national basis, there would be a very different picture in London, which must impact on quite a few members of the Committee. Will the hon. Lady comment on the rationale for looking at the national picture as opposed to the regional picture? For example, local government in London will be dealing with child poverty figures based on a national assessment when, in fact, if it were assessed on a London-only basis, a much greater percentage would be seen to be in relative poverty. Is there a risk that a national picture would do less as a result?

Helen Goodman: I do not believe so. We have introduced the Bill to tackle child poverty throughout the whole country, and we make it clear in part 2 that we do not believe that central Government have all the answers. We want a partnership with local authorities, where they can do best. We have made it clear in clause 20 that in specific cases local authorities can co-opt further partners, such as those suggested by the hon. Gentleman. I hope that, with those reassurances, hon. Members will agree to the clause.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 20 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 21

Local child poverty needs assessment

Andrew Selous: I beg to move amendment 7, in clause 21, page 12, line 26, after assessment, insert including an assessment of
(i) job creation, and
(ii) family resilience.

Martin Caton: With this it will be convenient to discuss amendment 72, in clause 21, page 12, line 26, at end insert
including the levels of benefit and tax credit take up among the eligible populations.

Andrew Selous: Clause 21 is an important clause; it deals with the local child poverty needs assessment. I shall speak first to amendment 7, which is in my name and that of my hon. Friends the Members for South-West Hertfordshire and for Billericay, and then touch on amendment 72, which was tabled by the hon. Member for Regents Park and Kensington, North.
I want to focus, in relation to amendment 7, on the issues of job creation and family resilience. I shall not repeat what I said when I tabled an amendment to clause 8 along the same lines, with respect to economic enterprise, which my hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness has drawn attention to. When local authority leaders and chief executives spoke in our witness sessions about dealing with child poverty, the first thing on which they all alighted was an increase in economic activity in their areas. If I were to sum up what we need to do above all to beat child poverty, I would put it in four wordsmore and better jobs. In other words, more people in work, and more people in higher-paid work.
I understand, of course, issues such as barriers to work, child care, flexible and part-time working, and acquiring the skills to get into jobs, but when we boil things down, those issue bring us to the heart of the Billthe balance between what we think the benefits system will do through out-of-work benefits, and so on, and the part that we expect enterprise and wealth creation to play in defeating child poverty. This is my second attempt to have that aspect of the matter included in the Bill. I make no apologies for that.
In my experience, local economic regeneration does not get the attention that it deserves in local authoritieseven in local authorities that recognise its importance and take it seriouslybecause it is not regarded as a core or key public service, in the way that education, social care, housing or transport are. Everyone is very clear that those are the things that the council does. It provides housing, mends potholes in the roads, looks after your granny when she gets ill, and educates your children. We all know that, but what is the role of the council in attracting new businesses to the area or helping the businesses already there to expand and grow?
I consider regeneration to be incredibly important. It will be vital in helping to drag the country out of the terrible, horrible recession that we are going through. The Government, of course, have a role to play in that, but local authorities have an important role. I have for months been vocal as unemployment in my area has, sadly, risen, and have said that local economic regeneration should be at the top of the councils priorities.
The sustainable communities plan that has been imposed on certain parts of the country in relation to the need for extra housing growth includes targets for the creation of extra dwellings and jobs, but the emphasisthe drive from the Government officesseems to be on housing targets. I hear relatively little about what is being done to create the jobs needed for a genuinely sustainable community, so that the people in the new houses also have work. That is an incredibly important area that needs the help and focus of a mention in the Bill. The Government should make it clear to local authorities that the Bill is not just about public services, vital as they are in getting people out of poverty and helping parents to do better, but about good old-fashioned wealth creation, building bigger businesses, providing more and better jobs and enabling people to get into them.
I am aware that the challenge of getting into work from being out of work is huge. The move from not working and being on benefits into full-time work is an enormous stepsometimes almost a step too far that many people are not able to make in one leap. In relation to the creation of jobs, I was struck by some of the proposals discussed at a reception yesterday about the community allowance. I do not know whether other Committee members were able to attend. When the Minister responds to this part of the debate she will refer to the proposalit is to be trialled by the Government in north-east Lincolnshire, Tameside near Manchester and the Isle of Wightto extend the disregard for people on benefit, so that they can work up to 15 hours a week on the minimum wage without having benefit withdrawn. From April next year people on incapacity benefit and employment and support allowance will be able to earn £92 a week without having benefit withdrawn. The Government have committed to that and to the three pilots we learned of yesterday evening. I welcome that initiative which is on the right lines, although there is further to travel and more to be done.
When getting people off a life on benefitsif they remain on benefits, we know that their children will live in povertythese mini-jobs are an important way to help people into work. They may be very local with little need to travel and may be provided by community organisations, as proposed in the excellent community allowance document.
One other matter that is relevant to amendment 7 in the interaction of the benefits system with people in work is the informal economy. People may be in work but are not captured by data and do not have any involvement with the benefits system. The Financial Secretary will be familiar with an organisation called Community Links, and its national arm Links UK, which is actively involved in his constituency. I was struck when I met its representatives recently and they told me of a meeting they had in Salford with 30 young people aged between 15 and 25, who were not in education, employment or training. Some 23 out of 30 were involved in the informal economy and not receiving any benefits. We need to look at the community allowance proposals, mini-jobs and what is happening outside the benefits system, working tax credit, child tax credit and so on. Why are so many of our young people23 out of those 30 young people in Salfordworking in the informal economy?

The Chairman adjourned the Committee without Question put (Standing Order No. 88).

Adjourned till this day at Four oclock.